


This is where I want to be

by Garonne



Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Explicit Sexual Content, Found Family, M/M, POV Multiple, Post-Canon, Religious Content, Religious Faith, Team Bonding, Team as Family
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-12
Updated: 2020-08-12
Packaged: 2021-03-05 22:33:55
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,480
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25862890
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Garonne/pseuds/Garonne
Summary: Nicky, Joe, Nile and Andy lie low in Cyprus. Mostly Joe/Nicky, and Nile bonding with Nicky and Joe.
Relationships: Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
Comments: 36
Kudos: 458





	This is where I want to be

**_Nicky_ **

Nicky was woken by the soft click of the door swinging shut. He came quickly awake, but the room was still dark and quiet, nothing moving. In the dim light that came through the cracks in the shutters, he could see Nile's outline huddled on a mattress on the floor in the far corner of the room. Andy's sleeping bag was empty.

Behind him, Joe stirred, propping himself up on one elbow. " _Shhâl f es-sa'a ?_ "

Nicky felt for the phone he'd left on the floor by his head last night. The numbers blinked up at him: 05:47. " _Es-setta ghîr 'eshra._ "

Joe flopped back onto the mattress with a groan.

They were high in the Carpathians, in a house — a one-room hut, really — they had not occupied in over a century. Not since long before either Copley or Merrick was even born. Their first impulse after leaving London had been to hide away, to have time to regroup and plan their next move, in light of the knowledge that Booker had given up the location of at least one of their safehouses. No more than that, he'd sworn, and in theory Nicky believed him, but his skin still crawled every time he thought about it.

He lay back, shutting his eyes and debating whether to try falling asleep again or not. Joe was a warm, solid presence beside him, his breathing soft and steady as he dozed off again. It would have been the perfect morning for a long lie-in, if only they were alone.

He allowed himself to imagine it for a moment. Rolling over to cover Joe's body with his, bracing his hands on either side of Joe's shoulders, Joe warm and willing beneath him, arching his hips up to brush against Nicky's cock — 

Nicky bit his lip and took a deep breath, letting it out slowly. He turned to give Joe a quick kiss on the temple, then rolled out of bed.

Andy was outside, breathing life back into the previous night's fire. The cabin had no electricity or running water, and the previous evening they'd eaten outdoors by a campfire.

"Coffee?" she said.

"Please."

She added more water to the metal pan over the fire. "I've booked plane tickets for Nile and me. Budapest to Larnaca."

Nicky stared. "But... what about us?"

"Like you're not both gagging to get away on your own." She had turned away to root in her rucksack for the jar of coffee, but now she cast him a smirk over her shoulder.

 _Well, yes, but..._ "We thought we'd come with you and Nile for a bit."

Andy's eyes narrowed. "If you're going to start babysitting me, Nicky, I swear, it's not going to be pleasant."

"No, but..."

How to explain the impulse that had gripped him? He was reluctant to let Andy out of his sight. Couldn't shake the feeling that each time she walked away would be the last time he'd ever see her. He'd get over it — he hoped — but right now the wound was too new and fresh.

"It's not just you, but Nile too," he argued. "We barely know her. We'll just come with you for a short while. _Una settimana e basta._ "

"Fine." She picked up one of the plastic containers they used to fetch water and headed for the stream, throwing back over her shoulder, "But if I walk in on you two fucking on the sofa you're leaving." 

Joe came out of the cabin, blinking and scrubbing at his eyes.

"We're going to Cyprus with Nile and Andy," Nicky told him. "And — "

"No fucking on the sofa. Yeah, I heard. There better be a bedroom and a bed, that's all."

* * *

**_Joe_ **

Andy had rented a house in the Troodos mountains, a few kilometres out of Paphos. Joe heartily approved of her choice. It was an area they'd known for centuries — heavily frequented by tourists nowadays, but they couldn't hide away from civilisation forever, and didn't want to. And it had multiple bedrooms.

Joe dumped his and Nicky's bags in one of the rooms and wandered back out to the front of the house to look for the others. Nicky and Andy had taken the motorbikes to the nearest village for supplies, but Nile was still here somewhere. He found her in the living room, sitting at the dining table staring at her clasped hands. She gave a start and looked up when Joe entered the room.

She had been quiet ever since they left London. Joe didn't know her well enough to tell whether that was her usual state.

"You okay?" he asked.

"Yeah, sure." 

She probably wasn't, not really, but Joe didn't know what to say to let her know he was there if she wanted to talk. Nicky would be better at this.

Nile stood up, stretching her hands above her head. "So, uh... what are you guys gonna do?"

"You mean, right now?"

She shrugged. "I just... Andy told me you were an army of four, and then I spent the next two days running from one firefight to the next. I'm guessing not every single day of your lives is like that?"

"Well..." Joe drew it out, making her laugh, then shook his head. "I don't know about Andy, but Nicky and I are gonna laze around and do absolutely nothing for a week."

Her eyes widened, and he wondered whether she really had thought she was supposed to act like a superhuman and jump right into the next mission.

"I don't know if you've been keeping track of how many times you died in the last three days," he added. "I haven't. But you shouldn't just bounce up from that and keep going unless you have to, even when your body says you're fine. Even in the Marines you must have gotten downtime, right?"

She nodded, then turned her head to the door as Nicky and Andy came in. Nicky disappeared into the kitchen with the bags they'd brought, and Andy took a quick look around the room and then moved to explore the rest of the house, probably checking out escape routes and lines of sight.

Joe had noticed Andy was still wincing when she moved too fast. How long did it take a stomach wound like that to heal? He didn't remember. Weeks or months, probably. He hated the idea of it, the fragility it implied.

He was glad Nicky had insisted they come here, despite Andy's glowers. She had clearly been expecting the two of them to shack up somewhere and disappear for weeks. And that had certainly been Joe's first impulse, but he didn't want to leave Andy nor Nile right now, for two totally different reasons.

That evening Nicky and Nile did most of the talking while they ate, comparing Chicago in the 21st century to the 1850s, the only time Nicky and Joe had been there. It almost filled the hole at the table where Booker's downbeat sense of humour should have been.

"You've been to Chicago, right, boss?" Nicky said.

"Sure. When it was Algonquian hunting ground."

"Wow." Nile transferred her questions from Nicky to Andy. "How did you end up there?"

She was good at getting Andy talking. Joe was impressed. She managed to get stories out of Andy that Joe himself never had.

It was late by the time they finished eating, the sun already setting. Joe cleared away the plates and came back into the living room to find Nile already gone to bed, and Andy pulling on her jacket for a late-night walk.

"Bed?" Joe mouthed, catching Nicky's eye, and Nicky nodded.

The bedroom was cool and dark, one window just catching the last rays of sunshine over the mountains. 

"Yusuf," Nicky said softly, closing the bedroom door behind him, and Joe turned to meet his kiss.

They hadn't been alone like this since Marrakesh. Joe had needed this, yearned for this, after everything they'd been through in the past seventy-two hours. He leaned into Nicky, pressing him up against the door, pressing their mouths together until Nicky groaned.

They stayed like that for a long moment, just kissing.

" _Ashnou bghiti?_ " Nicky murmured, his voice low and full of promise.

Joe stopped to think. What did he want? He wanted everything, all at once, his body reacting instinctively to Nicky's presence, cock hardening as Nicky's soft breath tickled his neck. He ran his gaze down Nicky's body to the soft, inviting mound in his jeans. That was what he wanted. "I want to ride you."

Nicky's lips curved into a smile. "I think that can be arranged."

They tumbled back onto the bed, hastily shedding clothes. Joe closed his eyes, letting himself get lost in the knowing touch of Nicky's fingers. Later, as he looked down at Nicky, at his eyes shut and head thrown back, face transfigured in beautiful agony, he felt his heart swell with emotion. "Yusuf," Nicky gasped, hands tightening on Joe's hips, their bodies moving in achingly familiar patterns, until Joe collapsed face down on the bed, fucked out and gasping for air.

Nicky's hand was moving in lazy circles on his back. " _Era buono?_ " His voice was low and hoarse, breath still coming hard.

Joe let out a long, breathy chuckle. " _Puoi dirlo forte._ " They lay in comfortable silence, languid and sated. After a few minutes Joe turned over. Nicky's eyes were closed, but they fluttered open as Joe ran a hand along his jaw, the faintest trace of stubble scratching under his fingertip. "We should go out to Akamas tomorrow, see if that cave is still there."

Nicky grunted in agreement. Then after half a minute, as though his brain were only now catching up with the conversation, he said, "Isn't that where we first..."

"No, that was in Crete."

Nicky hummed softly. "So it was."

They fell into a comfortable silence again. Joe heaved a sigh, and staggered out of bed for a damp cloth. Then Nicky rolled onto his side, and Joe curled up behind him, one arm slung over him to hold him close as they settled down to sleep. Outside, the wind whispering in the trees mingled with the distant crash of waves on the shore. Closer by, footsteps in the corridor were followed by one of the other doors clicking shut, Andy or Nile going past.

Joe blinked awake, recalling his earlier conversation in the living room. "Have you spoken to Nile?"

Nicky stirred, voice sleepy when he spoke. "I think we should let her come to us," he said, knowing what Joe meant without him having to elaborate. "Or to Andy."

"I doubt Andy remembers what it was like. Or remembers the first few people she killed."

"Maybe not. But it doesn't mean she feels the others any less."

Joe made a noise of agreement in his throat.

After a moment Nicky said, "When we found Booker...I've always thought we didn't handle that well."

"Was there any good way of handling it?"

"That wouldn't have brought us here, you mean? I don't know."

"Booker made his own choices, Nico."

Joe felt Nicky tense in his arms, then deliberately relax. "Yeah," he said softly. "But you'll miss him too."

Joe didn't need to answer. Nicky already knew. He also knew there were some griefs nothing could heal, and that was nobody's fault. "With Nile things will be different," he said, a vow rather than a statement of fact.

Nicky turned his hand over so they were palm to palm, fingers entwined, and held on tightly until they both fell asleep.

* * *

**_Andy_ **

Andy ached all over. She'd spent the day sparring with Nile, then with Joe, then with Nile again. And she hadn't lost her edge, she hadn't started to flinch at each blow, but fuck it, she hurt now afterwards.

Nicky and Joe were still here in Cyprus, of course, three weeks after their arrival, despite initially claiming they'd only stay a week. Right now the two of them were in the kitchen with Nile, eating Nicky's tajine, while Nile told them about the latest in infrared technology supplied to the Marines just before she'd left.

Andy went outside to the front of the house, an open space of dry dusty gravel with a view over the forest-covered mountain slopes and the sea far below. She sat on one of the rocks scattered across a patch of scrubby yellow grass on the hillside.

There wasn't a single sign of human habitation in view, just the thickly growing pine and cedar trees and the sun sparkling on the deep blue surface of the sea. The view would have been the same when she first came to this island, probably around... two and a half thousand years ago, maybe. She couldn't remember exactly.

The future had a different shape now. Finite. Bounded. A mortal's future. It brought an odd sort of freedom. If only Nicky and Joe would stop fucking wincing every time she winced. She knew why they did it, but that didn't mean she liked it. It was easier in some ways to be with Nile, who didn't have nine hundred years behind her of thinking Andy immortal.

That wall in Copley's office didn't cover all nine hundred years of their lives, and only a tiny fraction of Andy's. And even that was... a lot. Andy hadn't sat down to think about that yet, preferring to let it float around at the back of her conscious mind. Something to take out and examine some day in the future, maybe. Or maybe never.

 _You can't see it because you're in it,_ Nile had said.

Maybe. Andy was not convinced, but she knew the revelation of Copley's research meant something to Nile, and that was already a good thing.

For her own part, she needed time to figure out how she felt about it.

And right now, she needed to get away from here for a while. Get drunk, get laid.

She got to her feet, rolling her shoulders and stretching her back. Far overhead, a falcon hovered, a fleck of brown in the deep blue sky, and she watched it for a moment until it plunged into the trees far below. She turned back towards the house.

Back inside, Nile and Nicky were watching some sort of game show on Greek TV, Nicky providing a running translation. Joe was scribbling in his journal — writing or sketching, Andy couldn't see which.

"I'm leaving this evening," Andy announced. "I have some stuff to take care of."

They all looked up. Andy could see Nicky bite back the question _"where?"_ and had to swallow a smirk of her own. He was learning.

"Okay," Joe said cautiously.

"You said you wanted time to get to know Nile," she added. "Well now you'll have it."

Nile's eyes were still wide and surprised, and Andy took pity on her. "I'll be back in a few weeks. Don't let these two get out of hand."

* * *

**_Nile_ **

"I'm going into town," Joe announced at the breakfast table, the morning after Andy left. "Want to come into Paphos?"

Nicky shook his head. "I'm going for a long run."

Joe turned an inquiring gaze on Nile.

She shrugged. "Sure, why not?" She had quickly realised that Nicky and Joe were not quite as inseparable as they had first seemed — actually, that would have been impossible — but she still hadn't spent much time with one without the other. "I'll just grab my stuff."

"Don't let him buy too many books, Nile," Nicky said when she came back with her jacket. Joe made a face, and Nicky laughed. "You're going to buy more than you can read while we're here, aren't you? And then who's carrying them to the next place?"

"You wound me, Nicolo," Joe said, but he took the shopping list Nicky held out.

Nile had noticed Nicky always wrote in the Arabic script, and she wondered suddenly if that was the first alphabet he'd learned. Could people generally read and write at the time of the Crusades? She had only the vaguest knowledge of what life was like in Europe a millennium ago. Still hadn't got her head around the idea that these two had lived through it.

It suddenly occurred to her, for the first time, that she was probably going to see the year 3000. Her mind was still boggling over that as she followed Joe out back to where they stored the motorbikes they'd hired.

Paphos was a cream and white jewel on the rocky coastline. It was also full of tourists, crowding the sun-filled streets and snapping photos. Nile felt oddly detached from the crowd, but the holiday mood and the new surroundings lightened her heart all the same. It was the first time she'd ever been a tourist abroad, not counting a day trip to Kaiserslautern with the rest of her unit when she'd been in stationed briefly in Germany on the way to Afghanistan.

They took a walk through the town and along the seafront. Joe was not the chattiest of guys, but he pointed out some places of interest here and there. It was nice, just walking side by side, not having to be anywhere in particular. 

In the bookstore Joe took her to next, Nile caught him peering over her shoulder as she was browsing through the tiny English-language section.

He grinned at her, unabashed. "I don't know what you like to read. Or even if you like to read at all."

"Depends on the book." She hadn't had a lot of time to read in her life up to now, what with school, combat training and deployment. Dizzy used to lend her books from time to time. But there was no point thinking about Dizzy and Jordan now. "You find what you were looking for?"

Joe nodded. "Yep."

On the way from the bookstore to the market, they passed a church, a solid limestone building with domed roofs, one of several Nile had already seen today. A weekday service had just finished, and people were coming out into the square in the front of the church singly and in small groups. Nile stopped, feeling a tug at her heart.

She used to go every Sunday, back home with her family, and once a week in Afghanistan, whenever the duty roster permitted. The last time had been four weeks ago. The chapel tent on base seemed a million miles away now.

 _You hear me, God?_ she thought. _Cause I know I haven't had much to say for myself these past few weeks, but... I'm still here. You still see me?_

She realised she had stopped walking, and Joe had turned back to face her.

"Want to go in?" he asked, nodding towards the church. "I'll wait for you."

She shook her head.

Joe's gaze was fixed on her, his dark eyes serious. "Nothing's changed, you know. God hasn't changed. He's not with you any less now than before."

Nile stared, surprised. "You — ? I thought..." She had assumed that Joe, like Andy, had long since lost any faith he might once have had. She took a deep breath, rubbing the back of her neck. "Yeah, I know that," she said finally. "But I feel like... I've lost something. Some... conviction."

"I've known the feeling. Sometimes lasts for years — for decades, take it from me. But not forever."

"Oh." She eyed him doubtfully.

He smiled. "Nicky says faith is like love. It's not something you choose to fall into or out of, it just happens."

"Do you think that?"

Joe laughed softly. "Well, you know Nicky. He thinks deep thoughts. Me, I've always found being in love a lot easier than holding onto faith."

Nile thought about that for a while. She wanted to feel comforted, but too many uncomfortable thoughts were still swirling round in her brain. They'd been lurking in her head since London, a constant looming accompaniment. She had thought she might try to confide in Nicky or Andy, but Joe was right there, and she burst out, "I always knew I was probably gonna kill somebody someday. Maybe a lot of people, even. That's what I signed up for, right?"

He didn't blink at the change of subject — and in fact it wasn't a change of subject, not really. He just waited for her to go on.

"Do you keep track? Do you even know how many people you've killed?"

Joe shook his head, eyes sober. "No, I don't."

Nile swallowed around the burning sensation in her throat. "Do you know how many times you've died?"

"No."

She thought she knew a lot about mental resiliency and psychological adjustment to combat. She'd had plenty of hours of training on it. But this was a whole other level. "But how do you...live with it?"

"If there was an easy answer, Nile, we'd have told you already." 

Nile grimaced. She turned away, staring up into the bright blue sky, the sun searing against her closed eyelids.

"If you could go back in time," Joe said quietly, "to before you walked into Merrick's HQ, would you do the same thing again?"

"Yeah," she said without hesitation.

She glanced at him, and he tilted his head in silent acknowledgment of the statement. And maybe that was part of the answer, Nile thought. But not all of it.

"I'm still wondering how you don't go crazy," she muttered.

Now his gaze softened. "By not trying to do it alone."

Nile considered that for a while. Maybe that was... an answer she could live with. "Okay," she said finally. "Come on, where's this market of yours?"

When they got back to the house, Nicky was in the living room, reading, his hair still wet from the shower. He smiled at Nile, and lifted his head to kiss Joe. " _Allora, com'è stato?_ "

"Same as always. Except they're selling phone chargers in the market now, lucky for me." Joe dumped his rucksack on the table and started to pull stuff from it. "Also, we found something Nile has never eaten."

He put a huge paper bag of something he had called amygdalota on the table, and added a stack of about ten books.

Nicky looked reproachfully at Nile. "I was counting on you, Nile," he said gravely. But he was already starting to sort through the stack of books.

Nile laughed, shaking her head.

Nicky came to one book, something about birds of the steppes, and looked up at Joe, a slow smile spreading across his face.

"Thought you might like that," Joe said smugly.

Nicky flipped through the book a minute longer, then closed it and looked up at Joe. "Did you get the..."

"Yeah." Joe drew a box from his rucksack and pushed it across the table to Nile. It was a smartphone. She looked up at him, curious. He must have gotten it while she was in the clothing store.

"I already have a phone," she said. Andy had set her up with one before they left London, a Nokia that looked like it was almost as old as she was, and warned her about not keeping the same number long, not building up an online presence, and above all, not logging into any of her old social media or streaming accounts.

"Yeah, but you can't listen to music on that, can you?" Joe handed her a card, one of those prepaid ones for a streaming service. "It's all set up and ready to go."

"Oh," she said, surprised, turning the box over in her hands.

"When we dreamed about you," Nicky said, "you always had music in your head."

She looked up, feeling suddenly stupidly and unexpectedly tearful.

"Thanks, guys."

Joe grinned at her, then reached for the paper bag on the table. "So, what about these cookies? I don't know about you, but I don't intend to wait for dessert."

* * *

**_Nicky_ **

Nicky sat sprawled on the sofa, eyes closed, pleasantly tired after an afternoon sparring with Nile in the sun. He had the book Joe had brought him in his hands, but he was no longer reading. Instead he was listening to Joe telling Nile about the time they all got lost in a coal mine in the Appalachians.

Nicky let the words wash over him, paying attention only to the cadence of Joe's voice and not the meaning. He could listen to Joe speaking all day.

He remembered idly the phase Joe had once gone through of reading erotic poetry aloud to him. Anything they could get their hands on, verses Joe had written himself... They hadn't done that in four or five decades at least. He stored it away in his mind as something to suggest later on.

"Hungry?" Joe asked.

Nicky opened one eye. "I could eat if you're cooking," he said cautiously.

Joe laughed. He disappeared into the kitchen.

Nicky got up and wandered over to the table. Joe had been sketching earlier that day while Nile and Nicky sparred, and the table was littered with his drawings. There were some nice ones of Nile there, each captured in a few swift strokes: Nile lying back in the grass laughing up at the sky, Nile in the middle of a roundhouse kick, Nile holding Nicky's sword up in the air and grimacing. The length and equilibrium of it were completely wrong for her height, but Nicky would love to see her with a better sword in her hand. He'd never warmed to the idea of having only one weapon, especially when it was a weapon that became useless as soon as you ran out of ammunition.

"Have you guys heard from Andy?" Nile asked.

Nicky looked up from the sketches. "She won't contact us without contacting you too. You're part of the team now too."

She nodded. "Yeah."

Nicky put down the drawings and sat at the table opposite Nile. He thought for a moment, weighing his words before he spoke. "Insofar as you want to be. I know you didn't choose this. None of us did. But whenever you get fed up of this life... We'll still be here for you when you come looking for us."

"I know," said Nile. "But this is where I want to be." 

Nicky smiled, and after a moment Nile's determined gaze softened and she smiled back.

"So, uh, I didn't know Joe could cook," she said.

"Mmm. On occasion."

An hour later, while they were eating, the sound of a motorbike pulling up outside had them all looking up.

"Andy," Joe said, and it was.

"Still alive, as you see," she said pointedly to Nicky as she hugged each of them in turn.

Nicky grinned sheepishly. "Uh huh."

"Come on, boss," Nile said as they sat back down. "You're just in time for Joe's spanakopita."


End file.
